BAMYou previously worked
at the University of Michigan, heading the Weiser Center for Emerging
Democracies and the Weiser Center for Europe and Eurasia. What drew you
to Watson?

Frank Mullin

Kennedy has a vision for the Watson Institute.

Michael KennedyIt
seemed to combine the best of all possible worlds. On the one hand,
Watson has historically engaged with the most pressing issues facing
the world, so I have a great tradition and legacy on which to draw. On
the other hand, it is more agile than any organization I've been
involved with. It is not defined it terms of regions or existing areas
of research. It is defined simply in these terms: how is it that we can
best address the most pressing global issues?

BAMWhat are your goals and objectives for the institute?

KennedyWhen the
Watson Institute was founded, it was founded around a clear and
pressing global question—how is it that we are going to reduce the
risks of global nuclear confrontation between the Soviets and the
Americans? Today, the world has changed. First and foremost, there is
no clear pressing central issue. The first and most important challenge
for us is to think about the relationships among all the world's
different problems. Right now we have experts who work on any one of
them. What we can begin to do is to think about the relationships among
them.

BAMThe Watson Institute has long been renowned for its focus on global inequality. Will that continue?

KennedyYes. But
the other side of this is we have to think about the dispersal of power
across the world—the ways in which different relationships organize
around the flow of small arms, the flow of people, the flow of capital,
and the flow of ideas. What we want to understand is the relationship
among different global "flows"—of disease, of environmental risk, of
investment, of weapons, and so on.

BAMAs a sociologist, your own research has been on Eastern Europe after the Soviet Union. Why?

KennedyAfter the
Berlin Wall fell, I began to think it was good to study social
movements because they challenge systems. I wound up studying what
everyone calls "transition"—the movement from planned to market economy
and from dictatorship to democracy.

BAMWe hear you love golf.

KennedyOne of the joys
I've discovered in my international work is that some places really
love to take you golfing. I especially loved one round of golf I played
in South Korea. I never had a better caddy in my life. Every time I
followed his advice on how to putt I made it! It's only when my
chutzpah got the better of me that I missed the putt.

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